Reflect on current social networking technologies and how they might be used for educational purposes. You can also outline some concerns you have with these technologies.
There are numerous social networking technologies that are currently in use throughout the world. I feel that the most popular social networking technologies are: facebook, twitter and skype.
Facebook is a social network that connects people through status updates, picture uploads, video uploads, comments, games and wall posts. This network can be used for educational purposes by the primary use of group work or whole group activities. Teachers can allow students to use facebook for a discussion board where they can have discussions and debates about class topics and various subject matter in relation to the curriculum. Facebook could also be used for students to create a "blog" type enviornment where they post notes or individual assignments and get feedback from their classmates.
Twitter is yet another social network that is becoming more popular daily. This network can be used to do group assignments where immediate feedback is needed. This can be used as a chat room for students where they can get immediate feedback about their individual work, communite with partners during group work or communite with the teacher. This network would really benefit a classroom setting where the need to have immediate responses is ideal.
Skype is yet another social network that involves chatting and video. This is primarily beneficial for group projects because the group can work from a distance but still talk and see one another. This is extremely useful during online classes when all assignments are completed primarily from a distance; therefore group projects are more manageable when they have more structure and the group members are able to communite with one another through virtual technology and have more of a hands on experience.
I have not used Twitter but did not even think about Skype. That is such an easy one as we found out in the last class. Skypeing with classmates made it so much easier to keep up with assignments as well as even learning a little more about your classmates. I need to look into Twitter a little more as I see so many people use that one. Thanks for your Blog.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I don't use Twitter myself, I feel that the immediate feedback would be helpful for group work. And with any and all social media, teachers need to make clear the expectations of how they will use it to communicate. Students need to know how teachers use it so that they will know if/when a response can be expected because it may not be immediate if a teacher does not use the particular form of social media every single day. And we use Skype all of the time to chat with our family in the US. Never thought about using it for group work!
ReplyDeleteKevin